Ty Simpson said he turned down some massive NIL offers from other schools to transfer instead of declare for the 2026 NFL Draft.
The former Alabama quarterback declared for the draft a week after the Crimson Tide were eliminated from the College Football Playoff. He told On3 in a story published Tuesday night that Ole Miss, LSU, Miami and Tennessee were among the schools who inquired about a potential transfer over the weekend. And Miami was apparently prepared to offer significantly more money than even LSU and Tennessee.
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But Simpson stuck with his decision to head to the NFL.
Simpson said the offers were pouring into his agent. Miami and Tennessee both said they would pay him $4 million. Ole Miss also jumped in around the $4 million mark, and Tennessee said it could possibly go as high as $5 million. Eventually, Miami ran the tab up to $6.5 million.
“Miami was kind of like, ‘All right, we’re moving on,’ and then they lost out on Sam Leavitt and came back with that big number,” Simpson said. “And then Ole Miss called again and said they could match it.”
To put those offers to Simpson into context, the biggest known NIL deal a transfer QB has signed this offseason is Brendan Sorsby’s $5 million deal with Texas Tech.
Simpson said he ultimately didn’t want to be a guy who stayed in college because he received a huge NIL payment to change teams.
“ [Coach Kalen DeBoer and offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb] have been so good to me,” Simpson said. “I’m sure they were wondering what was going on because they wanted a decision from me last Thursday so they could start building their roster for next year. I was honest and told them what I’d been offered, but that I just couldn’t do it because of everything I stood for and what Alabama had meant to me and the legacy that I built there. Everybody would just remember me as the guy who took all this money and went to Miami or Tennessee for his last year. But I was a captain. I put my hand and footprints in the cement at Denny Chimes.
“I would have lost everything that I built at Alabama.”
A year ago, Miami’s NIL deal with QB Carson Beck was worth a reported $4 million and the biggest of the transfer cycle. That’s worked out pretty well. Even as Beck was recovering from elbow surgery this offseason, he’s helped lead the Hurricanes to the national championship game against Indiana on Monday night.
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Simpson started just one season at Alabama after backing up Jalen Milroe and Bryce Young. The fourth-year junior was 305-of-473 for 3,567 yards and 28 TDs and 5 interceptions in 2025. He could end up being a first-round pick in the upcoming draft, especially if Oregon’s Dante Moore decides to return to school for another season.
LSU, meanwhile, signed Leavitt, a former Arizona State QB, via the transfer portal on Monday. However, the other three schools are still currently facing uncertain quarterback situations for 2026.
Ole Miss is hoping for a sixth season of eligibility for starter Trinidad Chambliss as Week 1 starter Austin Simmons has already transferred to Missouri. The NCAA has denied Chambliss’ waiver efforts for an extra season, and Chambliss is pursuing legal action. Tennessee QB Joey Aguilar is also looking for a waiver for a seventh year of college football after he spent time at a junior college, but his waiver effort also seems unlikely to succeed. Beck is out of eligibility after the national title game.
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None of the three teams have added a starting-caliber QB in the transfer portal. And, barring a surprise addition to the portal before it closes on Jan. 16 or successful efforts against the NCAA, all three could enter the 2026 season with significant questions at quarterback.
Who will be the fourth-ever Pittsburgh Steelers head coach? Yahoo Sports’ Andrew Siciliano, Charles Robinson and Frank Schwab break down the impact of Mike Tomlin stepping down as head coach of the Steelers, along with the fate of Aaron Rodgers. Could the 42-year-old QB retire? The crew also discusses the Philadelphia Eagles and Los Angeles Chargers firing their offensive coordinators. Plus, should eliminated Wild Card teams panic ahead of the offseason?
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(0:00) – Mike Tomlin steps down
(23:57) – Is this it for Aaron Rodgers?
(38:05) – OCs Kevin Patullo & Greg Roman fired
(47:43) – Should these eliminated playoff teams be panicking?
(1:03:30) – One More Thing
Where will Mike Tomlin go next after stepping down as the head coach of the Steelers? (Photo by Joe Sargent/Getty Images)
Following a 24-1 start for OKC, the Spurs had exposed the Thunder as vulnerable. They beat the Thunder on Christmas for a third time in a span of two weeks to drop Oklahoma City to 26-5 with its fourth loss in six games.
Thunder take control with defense, dominant third quarter
Victor Wembanyama attempted to set the tone with two dunks over personal rival Chet Holmgren in the game’s opening minutes. The Thunder responded to take a 32-26 lead the Spurs cut to 55-52 at halftime.
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But the Thunder opened the floodgates with a 40-24 edge in the third quarter that they extended to a 102-80 lead in the fourth. With Shai Gilgeous-Alexander resting in the fourth, the Spurs cut into the lead, But they never challenged again as the Thunder issued their best reminder since their slump started that they’re the reigning champs for a reason.
Oklahoma City won playing its style of basketball — with swarming defense that flustered San Antonio shooters and limited the Spurs to a 40% shooting night from the field. The Thunder challenged shots and passes en route to 11 blocks and 7 steals as their defense repeatedly led to easy buckets near the basket on the other end.
The result was a 52% shooting night for the Thunder as they improved to 34-7 on the season — not bad for a team with the sky supposedly falling around it. And it’s now good enough for a 6.5-game lead over the second-place Spurs in the West.
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SGA: ‘Tonight wasn’t our Super Bowl’
In a postgame interview, Gilgeous-Alexander acknowledged the Spurs previously flustered their signature defense and had “gotten the better of us,” but downplayed the importance of Tuesday’s win.
“Tonight wasn’t our Super Bowl,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “It wasn’t anything else but another game in an 82-game season. We’ve got to find ways to get better. We could have done things better tonight and will continue to do so and learn from them.”
Gilgeous-Alexander led the Thunder effort with 34 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists and a team-high 4 blocks. It was the type of effort that will help in his quest for a second straight league MVP award. Jalen Williams added 20 points on a 9-of 15 effort from the field as he continues to round into his former All-Star form after a wrist injury sidelined him for the start of the season.
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Holmgren struggled on offense in his matchup against Wembanyama as he attempted just four field goals in an 8-point effort. But he contributed elsewhere with 10 rebounds and 3 blocks.
Wembanyama was back in the starting lineup for a second straight night after coming off the bench in his return from knee and calf injuries. He made an apparent concerted effort to attack Holmgren on offense early in the game.
But the Thunder held him in relative check as Wembanyama tallied 17 points, 7 rebounds and 1 block. Stephon Castle led the Spurs with 20 points and 8 assists, but he also contributed 5 of San Antonio’s 11 turnovers on the night.
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The Spurs and Thunder have one game remaining on the schedule in San Antonio on Feb. 4. And if the NBA is lucky, they’ll play at least four more games in the postseason.
No. 2 Iowa State took its first loss of the season against Kansas on Tuesday, by enough points that it could very well count for two.
The unranked Jayhawks bulldozed the Cyclones 84-63 at The Phog, in the kind of way that an uninformed observer would just assume they were the second-best team in the country. Tre White led all scorers with 19 points on 6-of-13 shooting with 10 rebounds (6 offensive) and 3 assists, while star freshman Darryn Peterson had 16 points.
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Melvin Council Jr. also had 15 points and 7 rebounds, along with the early wake-up call.
Kansas was up double digits midway through the fourth quarter and up 21 at halftime. Iowa State made a push early in the second half, but the deficit never slipped below double digits.
“I thought the intensity was great. I hoped we showed some toughness,” Kansas coach Bill Self said. “Other than that seven minutes to start the second half, we played great the whole time. We shared it, were aggressive, and our defense was above what it has been.”
The Cyclones were cold across the floor on offense as well as mistake-prone, with leading scorer and All-America candidate Joshua Jefferson posting only 12 points on 4-of-14 shooting with 8 rebounds and 5 turnovers. Meanwhile, Kansas shot 50.8% from the field and 50% from 3-point range, with only nine turnovers.
It had been a rough go lately for Kansas, falling out of the AP Top 25 this week after losses to unranked UCF and West Virginia in its past three games. Had they lost Tuesday, it would have been their first 1-3 start in conference play since the 1987-88 season.
Instead, Tuesday was a reminder they still have the talent to be dangerous.
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🚨 Headlines
🏈 Tomlin steps down: Mike Tomlin is stepping down in Pittburgh after 19 years, 13 playoff appearances and one Super Bowl title with the Steelers. There are now nine NFL teams changing coaches this offseason, one shy of the record.
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🏀Best in the West: The Thunder crushed the Spurs, 119-98, to extend their lead atop the West and take revenge for San Antonio’s three straight wins over them in December.
⚾️ Arenado to Arizona: The Cardinals have traded eight-time All-Star Nolan Arenado to the Diamondbacks after five years in St. Louis. The 34-year-old third baseman, whose bat has declined precipitously in the last three years, has two years and $42 million left on his contract.
⛳️ Thanks, but no thanks? LIV Golf’s Bryson DeChambeau, Jon Rahm and Cam Smith appeared to distance themselves from the possibility of leaving to follow Brooks Koepka back to the PGA Tour. “I’m contracted through 2026,” DeChambeau said, “so I’m excited about this year.”
🏈 NFL streaming record: The Bears’ comeback win over the Packers in the Wild Card Round averaged 31.61 million viewers on Prime Video, making it the most-streamed NFL game ever.
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🏈 Ready for Indiana vs. Miami? Well, hurry up and wait
(Giphy)
College football loses all its momentum in the wait for a championship game. Something must change.
So, how about those College Football Playoff semifinals last week, huh? A thrilling Miami win, a dominant Indiana performance! Can’t wait to see those two unlikely-but-deserving programs square off in … wait, another week from now?
Yes, like a defensive lineman that recovered a fumble in his own red zone, the college football season started with unstoppable momentum and now, with the end in sight, is collapsing in a chaotic heap of its own making.
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In addition to final exams and holidays, college football also must navigate around the behemoths that are Tradition and NFL Football. Tradition is why college football must rotate its entire schedule around the bowls and New Year’s Day, and the NFL is why college football has to surrender the Saturdays it’s stacked up throughout the entire fall.
The result of all these competing forces is the dog’s breakfast of a schedule that the College Football Playoff has become. By the time this is all over, CFP games will have been played on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
(Giphy)
Indiana will have played exactly two football games between the Big Ten championship on Dec. 6 and the national championship 45 days later on Jan. 19. Two full weeks of NFL playoffs will air between the semifinals and the national championship.
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This isn’t sustainable, and that doesn’t even factor in the madness that is the transfer portal opening and closing in the middle of all this, along with all its attendant coach movement.
No matter what, the college football powers that be have to get the sport finished up earlier than late January. Every bit of momentum from a magical, ridiculous season will have bled away by then. The season has to end earlier, ideally before the NFL playoffs start, but absolutely no longer than wild card weekend.
Problem is, the NFL’s not going to give up the Monday night playoff game it’s held since 2021; college football missed the window on that one. But maybe a Tuesday night championship after the first wild card weekend would be better than waiting another six days…?
No matter which way the sport goes in the future, it’s still nearly a week to go until the 2026 national championship kicks off. Might as well spend that time kicking around ideas for the future.
My Dad LOVES baseball. In 1950 when he was 18 years old, he hitchhiked from his home in southwestern Wisconsin to Chicago to see the 1950 All-Star Game at Comiskey Park — the first one that went extra innings!
Over the years, he passed that love down to his children, including me. He took us to Cubs games in the 60’s and eventually to Cubs and Brewers games in the 70’s. I stuck with the Cubs as my favorite team and there were a ton of lean years and a few “almosts” for the Cubbies during that stretch, but I never gave up hope that someday they would win a World Series.
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In 2003, the Cubs made it to the NLCS against the Florida Marlins and I was at Game 6 when they blew a 3-0 lead in the eighth inning (don’t blame Steve Bartman), losing 8-3 and mandating a nerve-wracking Game 7.
I was distraught after the game but woke up the next morning, excited and nervous about going that night. However, that morning my sister called me and told me that Dad had just suffered a cardiac arrest. He was in surgery and it was unclear if he was going to make it.
Dad lived three hours away in Madison, Wisconsin, so I told my sister that I was heading up immediately. But she said there was nothing I could do at the hospital. And knowing I had tickets to Game 7 she said that I should go and that, knowing Dad, he would be disappointed if I didn’t.
(Tom Wolf)
So I went to Game 7 and watched the Cubs lose 9-6. The fans were shocked. Angry. Devastated. I was at peace. I learned before the game that my Dad had survived his quintuple bypass surgery and that it looked like he was going to make it. When I drove to Madison to see him I said “next time you want to teach me a lesson about how baseball isn’t the most important thing in the world, be more subtle.” He said “deal!”
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13 years later, the Cubs did make it to the World Series and I took my 85-year-old Dad to the first home World Series game at Wrigley Field in 71 years. This time he didn’t have to hitchhike to get there!
The Cubs lost but we celebrated the occasion knowing that even though you can’t dictate the outcome of any game, you can always cherish the opportunity to share something special with someone special. Thanks, Dad.
P.S. Dad is still alive today at 94 years old. He’s no longer going to baseball games but he did stay up until 2 am to watch the end of the 2025 World Series Game 3 marathon! Go sports!
🏈 Divisional dominance: West is best
(Jonathan Castro/Yahoo Sports)
All season long we watched as the top three teams in the NFC West laid waste to the rest of the NFL.* And now here we are, with the Seahawks, Rams and 49ers making up nearly half the remaining playoff field.
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Exclusive club: The 2025 NFC West is just the fourth division in NFL history to send three teams to the Divisional Round, with Seattle earning the bye as the top seed and Los Angeles and San Francisco winning their Wild Card matchups. The other three:
1992 NFC East: The Cowboys, Eagles and Redskins all made the last eight, with Dallas ultimately winning Super Bowl XXVII and birthing a dynasty that would win three titles in four years.
1997 NFC Central: The NFC North predecessor sent the Vikings, Packers and Buccaneers to the Divisional Round. Green Bay fell just shy of winning back-to-back titles, losing to John Elway’s Broncos in Super Bowl XXXII.
2022 NFC East: The most recent instance featured the Cowboys, Eagles and Giants in the final eight. This time, it was Philly that reached the Big Game, where they lost a heartbreaker to the Chiefs in Super Bowl LVII.
*Three-headed monster: The 49ers, Rams and Seahawks went 6-6 against each other during the regular season… and 32-7 against everybody else, good for an .821 winning percentage.
📸 In photos: Winter Games warm-up
(Al Bello/Getty Images)
Athletes around the globe are deep in preparation for the Winter Olympics with the Milan-Cortina Games just 23 days away.
🇺🇸 Lake Placid, New York —Germany’s Emma Weiss competes in the aerial qualifiers during last weekend’s Freestyle World Cup event.
🇮🇹 Milan, Italy — Here we have a composite image depicting numerous moments during Saturday’s Coppa Italia at Milano Santagiulia Arena, which will host the Olympics hockey tournament.
Rink concerns? Construction is well behind schedule at the Olympic hockey venues, leading to concerns from the NHL, whose players are participating for the first time since 2014. The playing surface now appears to be heading in the right direction, but “listing everything that still needs to be finished would be impossible,” writes The Athletic’s Chris Johnston ($).
(Christian Bruna/Getty Images)
🇦🇹 Bischofshofen, Austria — Norway’s Isak Andreas Langmo competes in last week’s Ski Jumping World Cup event.
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Ski jumping vs. aerials: We shared two photos here of skiers jumping high in the air, so what’s the difference? Aerials (top photo) is a discipline in which athletes are judged on specific maneuvers, akin to the halfpipe. Ski jumping, meanwhile, is all about distance and form.
(Leo Authamayou/NordicFocus/Getty Images)
🇩🇪 Oberhof, Germany — Athletes compete during the men’s relay at last weekend’s Biathlon World Cup event.
Did you know? The biathlon is the only winter sport in which Americans have never won an Olympic medal. Campbell Wright, a New Zealander with American parents, will look to end that drought next month after recently becoming the first American ever to win two medals at a world championships.
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📺 Watchlist: Wednesday, Jan. 14
Rookie of the Year frontrunner Cooper Flagg takes the floor tonight in Dallas. (Ron Jenkins/Getty Images)
🏀 NBA on ESPN
The 76ers host the Cavaliers (7pm ET) in the first leg of tonight’s doubleheader, then the Mavericks host the Nuggets in the nightcap (9:30pm).
ROY watch: Two of our top three rookies, courtesy of Yahoo Sports’ Steve Jones, are in action tonight. No. 1 Cooper Flagg leads the Mavericks in total points, rebounds, assists and steals, while No. 3 VJ Edgecombe is averaging 16-5-4 for the surprisingly frisky 76ers.
⚽️ AFCON Semifinals
The final four teams in the 35th edition of the Africa Cup of Nations take the field today in Morocco, with Senegal vs. Egypt in the first semifinal (12pm, beIN Sports) followed by Nigeria vs. Morocco in the second (3pm, beIN Sports).
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Names to know:Former Liverpool teammates and global superstars Mo Salah (Egypt) and Sadio Mané (Senegal) square off in the first game, while 2024 African Player of the Year Ademola Lookman (Nigeria) and AFCON leading scorer Brahim Díaz (Morocco) meet in the second.
More to watch:
🏒 NHL: Flyers at Sabres (7:30pm, TNT); Golden Knights at Kings (10pm, TNT) … Philadelphia, Buffalo and LA all fell out of playoff position on Tuesday, and can all jump right back in with a win tonight.
🏀 NCAAM: Iowa at No. 5 Purdue (6:30pm, BTN); No. 10 Vanderbilt at Texas (9pm, ESPN2); Arizona State at No. 1 Arizona (10:30pm, FS1); No. 4 Michigan at Washington(10:30pm, BTN); No. 6 Duke at Cal (11pm, ACC)
⚽️ EFL Cup: Arsenal vs. Chelsea (3pm, Paramount+) … Semifinal, first leg.
Indiana’s Fernando Mendoza is one win away from becoming the fourth player in the CFP era (2014-present) to win the Heisman Trophy and the national championship in the same season.
Question: Which three players would he join?
Hint: They all play different positions.
Answer at the bottom.
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🏈 Let’s travel back to 2007…
Tomlin in 2007. (Jason Cohn/Icon Sport Media via Getty Images)
On Jan. 27, 2007, the Steelers promoted 34-year-old Mike Tomlin from defensive coordinator to head coach after the retirement of Bill Cowher. To get a sense of how long ago that is, here’s what else was transpiring around that date…
Peyton Manning had yet to win a Super Bowl.
Lane Kiffin was announced as the new head coach of the Oakland Raiders four days earlier. He is now on his sixth different job since then.
The Patriots had recently wrapped up a 16-0 regular season. You probably know what happened the next month.
The top picks of that year’s NFL Draft: JaMarcus Russell, Calvin Johnson, Joe Thomas. Two of them worked out.
Barry Bonds had yet to become MLB’s all-time home run leader.
Stephen Curry was a freshman at Davidson, and Tim Tebow was a freshman at Florida.
Novak Djokovic was more than a year away from his first Grand Slam title.
Usain Bolt was months from his first world championship medals.
Apple announced the first iPhone the same month.
Netflix, long known for DVD rentals through the mail, launched a video streaming service that month.
The No. 1 song on the billboard charts that month? Beyoncé’s “Irreplaceable.”
Barack Obama announced his first presidential campaign a month later.
Martin Scorsese was on the verge of his first Academy Award for “The Departed.”
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A frustrating season continued for the Milwaukee Bucks with their 139-106 loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves on Tuesday night. It was their 18th defeat in their past 27 games, and as they left the court at halftime down 76-45, the fans inside Fiserv Forum let them hear it with a chorus of boos.
Those boos would be surprisingly returned later in the game by their star player, Giannis Antetokounmpo, after he hit a shot in the paint and was fouled.
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Antetokounmpo gestured thumbs down to the crowd twice and let out an audible boo.
Antetokounmpo has done this before, but previously it was on the road to opposing fans — not his own. Afterward, he told reporters that he did not remember being booed by home fans before.
“I was definitely booing back. When I get booed, I boo back. I’ve been doing it all season. You [reporters] haven’t been with me on the road,” said Antetokounmpo. “Whenever I get booed, I boo back.”
The fact that the booing was coming from his own fans didn’t factor into Antetokounmpo’s decision to react.
Giannis Antetokounmpo of the Milwaukee Bucks reacts against the Minnesota Timberwolves during the third quarter at Fiserv Forum. (Photo by Patrick McDermott/Getty Images)
(Patrick McDermott via Getty Images)
“No, no, it does not matter. It doesn’t matter, I play basketball for my teammates,” he said. “I play basketball for myself and my family. When people don’t believe in me, I don’t tend to be with them. I tend to be against them. I tend to do what I’m here to do, what I’m good at, right?
“I think I’m like a maverick. I’ve always been that way, so won’t change now, it doesn’t matter if I am home, away. But, yeah, I’ve never been a part of something like that before, and I don’t think it’s fair. I don’t. But everybody has the opinion to do what they want to do; I’m not gonna tell them what to do or how to act when we don’t play hard, we lose games, or maybe not where we’re supposed to be. And I don’t think anybody has the right to tell me how I should act on the basketball court after I have been here 13 years. And I’m basically the all-time leader in everything.”
The T-Wolves were playing without a suspended Rudy Gobert or Anthony Edwards, who was out for injury management. Milwaukee head coach Doc Rivers said tired legs played a role in his team’s sluggish play. Antetokounmpo, however, disagreed.
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“I don’t think it’s dead legs,” he said. “Were we tired? Yeah, a little bit. We had a day off yesterday. I don’t see the reason.
“It’s not dead legs. I’m never going to say I didn’t have legs. I’m going to say that I could do things better. My effort wasn’t there. Maybe I wasn’t as focused as I should. And then after that, when I look at myself, I look at overall the team, what we can do better, but I don’t think it’s dead legs. That cannot be an excuse.”
The 17-23 Bucks are back at it on Thursday with the start of a two-game road trip in San Antonio before an afternoon matchup on Monday against Atlanta.
The Bucks are just outside of the Eastern Conference play-in, but their recent stretch has put them in a deep hole to dig out of. The fans’ frustrations will continue, especially when Antetokounmpo’s future with the franchise remains murky.
LeBron James wants Los Angeles Lakers fans to know he’s not pulling any strings behind the scenes. After nearly posting a historic triple-double Tuesday, James addressed comments his agent, Rich Paul, made during an episode of his podcast.
During that episode, Paul suggested the Lakers trade Austin Reaves to the Memphis Grizzlies in exchange for Jaren Jackson Jr. Given Reaves’ status as a fan favorite, and the fact that he’s one of James’ current teammates, James felt compelled to let people know he had nothing to do with Paul’s suggestion, per ESPN.
“I think you all know by now, Rich is his own man and what Rich says is not a direct reflection of me and how I feel,” James told ESPN on his way out of Crypto.com Arena. “And I hope people know that. I hope people know that and if they’re not sensible to know that, then I don’t know what to tell them.”
During the “Game Over with Max Kellerman and Rich Paul” show, Paul proposed a detailed trade offer that he believes would get the deal done. He explained that the move would give the Lakers a young big man to pair with Luka Dončić going forward, and would free up the Lakers from having to commit so much money to their backcourt. Reaves is eligible for a five-year, $241 million max contract extension this summer.
Reaves has missed time due to a calf injury, but he’s been excellent when on the court this season. In 23 games, Reaves is averaging a career-high 26.6 points, 6.3 assists and 5.2 rebounds. Jackson is a two-time All-Star and previous contender for the Defensive Player of the Year award.
Following Tuesday’s game, James also went out of his way to say his relationship with Reaves is still in a good place after Paul’s suggestion.
“AR knows how I feel about him,” James told ESPN. “All you got to do is look at us on the bench. Me and AR talk every single day. So, AR knows how I feel about him and I hope AR — or his camp — don’t look at me and think this is words from me are coming through Rich.
“Rich has his perspective of what he sees, I have my perspective. I’m a grown man, he’s a grown man and I think people should realize that grown men can say whatever the f— they want to say and it shouldn’t reflect somebody else is saying it.”
One of Reaves’ agents, Reggie Berry of AMR Agency, reportedly approached Paul at the Lakers game Tuesday night to discuss Paul’s trade proposal, per ESPN. The pair talked for more than five minutes.
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After Tuesday’s 141-116 win over the Atlanta Hawks, the Lakers sit at 24-14, good for fifth place in the Western Conference. While the team looks like a contender, its defensive ability has been questioned by some — including head coach JJ Redick.
Jackson could help solve that issue and give the Lakers more help at a weaker position. While a Reaves-for-Jackson swap makes some sense from that angle, James wants fans to know the idea didn’t come from him.
LeBron James was questionable for the Los Angeles Lakers with foot and back injuries on Tuesday, and there was some doubt he would play given that he hasn’t played both legs of a back-to-back all season.
So naturally he played and nearly posted the first triple-double by a 41-year-old in the history of the NBA. The Lakers star totaled 31 points on 12-of-20 shooting with 12 assists and 9 rebounds in a 141-116 blowout of the Atlanta Hawks.
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The win snapped a three-game losing streak for the Lakers, and a three-game winning streak for the Hawks.
The oldest player to post a triple-double in NBA history remains Karl Malone at 40 years, 127 days. James has the next 15 games on the list, but hasn’t posted one since Feb. 1 of last year, which was the 122nd of his career. At 41 years, 14 days old, he will take the record if he ever accomplishes the feat again.
“He’s gonna do everything he possibly can to play in his 23rd year. It’s remarkable. His competitive stamina is off the charts. We didn’t expect him to be able to play.”
James rising to play might also have something to do with the fact that he is exactly one missed game away from not being award eligible this season, which would snap his unprecedented 22-year All-NBA streak. He missed the Lakers’ first 14 games due to sciatica, and has sat out legs of three back-to-backs since his debut. Just last week, he was telling reporters he was TBD for every back-to-back left on the Lakers’ schedule.
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Alongside James’ near-triple-double was a 27-point, 12-assist night from Luka Dončić and a 17-point, 18-rebound performance from Deandre Ayton. Every Lakers starter scored in double figures, and collectively accomplished something never before seen in NBA history despite the absence of Austin Reaves.
After a close first quarter, the game steadily progressed into a blowout. The Lakers were up 21 points at halftime and led by double-digits for the entire second half.
The win improves the Lakers’ record to 24-14, still good for fifth in the Western Conference. They’re only 9-10 since Dec. 1, though, and are still under pressure to fully right the ship with a soft stretch of schedule ahead of them.
With the Memphis Grizzlies slated to play two games across Germany and England this week, star point guard Ja Morant plans to meet with key members of his camp in Europe in response to recent trade speculation, sources told Yahoo Sports.
Last Friday, the Grizzlies reportedly made Morant available in trade talks. The reported decision deeply disappointed Morant and his camp, according to a well-placed source close to the situation. The 26-year-old, who has been deeply invested in the city of Memphis and its fan base, hasn’t asked for a trade, sources said, but is essentially backed into a corner with the trade deadline less than a month away.
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“Live with it,” Morant bluntly told reporters in Berlin on Wednesday of his reaction to reports of his potential departure.
Morant, along with his business team — led by Phil Morant, Ja’s uncle, who takes lead on most of his day-to-day affairs — will discuss important next steps for the seventh-year pro.
While there is a collective understanding that Morant’s value is the lowest it’s ever been — a combination of the diluted point guard market, his injury and suspension history, and his offensive decline — his camp is determined to find the best solution through due diligence.
There are teams with varying levels of interest in Morant — Minnesota, Sacramento and Milwaukee to name a few — but Miami has quickly emerged as an attractive option to Morant and his camp in recent days, sources said.
The Heat have historically been regarded as one of the NBA’s most detail-oriented and structured organizations, a major aspect of development that appeals to Morant, who has missed 34 games due to various suspensions. Morant also has a deep respect for Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra, who also runs Team USA; Morant desires to represent his country in the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Miami’s veteran presence is an additional selling point and something Morant craves.
Additionally, Morant, with three years and $125 million remaining on his current deal, is hopeful of securing a max extension by next summer, sources said.
In the interim, Morant is aiming to return to 100% after missing time with a calf injury.
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“We are not in the business of commenting on random internet reports,” head coach Tuomas Iisalo told reporters in Germany on Tuesday. “He’s progressing in the practices. He’s already able to do a lot of the parts of practice, so looking good to progress [toward playing].”
Morant, who last played on Jan. 2 in Los Angeles, has appeared in just 18 games this season, averaging 19 points (his fewest since his rookie season) and 7.6 assists per game, while putting up career-lows in 3-point and effective field-goal percentage.
While in Europe, Morant also plans to spend time with Levallois Metropolitans, a third-division French basketball team which Morant acquired a significant ownership stake through his media and investment firm Catch12 last month.
Memphis, which has lost six of its past eight games, sits in 10th place in the Western Conference with a 17-22 record.
Jaylen Brown clearly had enough on Saturday. Despite driving into the paint 23 times against the San Antonio Spurs, the most that any player in the NBA had gotten downhill on that particular day, the former Finals MVP finished with zero free throws in the hard-fought game. The referee crew deemed that he was not fouled on any of his 23 drives or 28 shots from the floor. In the four-point loss, the Celtics took just four free throws the entire game, the second fewest in the history of the Celtics’ storied franchise.
“I’ll accept the fine at this point. I thought it was some bulls*** tonight,” Brown said in a minutes-long rant in front of reporters. “The inconsistency is f***ing crazy. Give me the fine. I got my conspiracies or whatever, but I don’t know what’s going on.”
(Grant Thomas/Yahoo Sports Illustration)
Brown wouldn’t specify the particulars of his theory, but he’s far from being alone in getting fed up with officiating this season. Brown is the latest player to get fined for comments or gestures toward the officiating — Dillon Brooks and Marcus Smart also got dinged earlier this season.
Three head coaches were recently fined by the league office for publicly criticizing referees within days of each other. Elsewhere, Steve Kerr had to be physically separated from crew chief Brian Forte last week while being kicked out of a Warriors game. After Monday’s loss to the Pacers, Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla mocked officials by repeatedly answering “illegal screen” in an apparent attempt to draw attention to Pascal Siakam’s pancake on Derrick White in the closing seconds. (The NBA’s L2M report said Siakam indeed should have been called for the foul.)
Aside from the public comments, a larger storm has been quietly brewing. Scoring has collapsed across the league and it has disrupted a key league partner. Among those who are trying to figure out what’s going on with officiating are sportsbooks and the gambling community.
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In January, including the Brown rant game, free throws have suddenly plummeted across the NBA, which has consequently suppressed scoring totals and led to a relentless cascade of bets cashing the under on point totals. In the long run, sportsbooks are quite efficient in predicting point totals and typically see over/under bets cash closely around 50% on either side, just as it had in October, November and December this season. But in the month of January, according to the Odds Shark bet tracking database, unders have cashed a remarkable 64.7% of the time, with normally sharp bookmakers wildly underestimating the mark on a nightly basis.
One longtime professional bettor flagged the sudden change in free throws early and told Yahoo Sports he has been hammering the unders: “We r printing (money) lol.”
Brown, coaches and sportsbooks are all wondering: What, if anything, is happening?
Free throws and fouls way down
It wasn’t long ago that teams enjoyed nightly parades to the free-throw line. During the opening weeks of the season in October, there were eight instances of a team shooting at least 40 free throws in a game. Contrast that to just two instances of a team shooting fewer than 10 free throws. In November and December, the big charity-stripe nights far outpaced the tiny ones.
But here in January, that ratio has flipped on its head. There have already been nine single-digit free-throw games in two weeks, the same number as November and December combined.
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Other parts of the game have stayed remarkably consistent. Two-point field goal percentage is almost identical month-to-month, while 3-point field goal percentage has slightly dipped to 34.7% in January compared to 35.5% leading up to it. Turnover rate and 3-point frequency has also held firm, according to pbpstats.com tracking.
But free throws? That’s been the main driver of the scoring decline. Team trips to the charity stripe, according to pbpstats.com data, have fallen from 26.1 free throws per 100 possessions in October to 24.6 in November to 23.1 in December to finally 21.7 in January, representing a nearly 20% decline from October to January in free-throw rate.
The end result is games are seeing about eight points on average being wiped away in the month of January.
The betting community has tried to keep up with the sudden drop in scoring. Sportsbooks have lowered the expected point totals further and further trying to find footing. According to Odds Shark data, the bottom began to fall out on Jan. 1 when all five games cashed the under and then proceeded to have a run of unexpectedly low-scoring games. In the first 12 days in January, not a single night on the schedule saw more overs than unders on the game slate. Between Jan. 5 and Jan. 7, the results tilted way off-balance; there were a whopping 20 unders to just six overs.
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Then on Jan. 10, the night of the Brown rant, Vegas bookmakers issued the lowest over/under line of the season, listed at 214.5 for the L.A. Clippers at Detroit game. They combined for 190.
On Monday night, four of the six games cashed the under, headlined by yet another single-digit night from Boston in the free-throw-attempt column. Vegas set the over/under total at 227.5 points in the infamous “illegal screen” night from Mazzulla’s news conference. Indiana and Boston combined for just 194, with neither team reaching 100 points. Indiana also finished with single-digit free throws.
The story of the night was Mazzulla begging for a foul call and not getting it.
The 2024 parallel
This wouldn’t be the first time the league saw a midseason change in how tightly the games were being called.
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In early March 2024, I reported that teams were seeing a precipitous drop in scoring, anchored mostly by a sudden decline in free throws granted by officials. Were officials told to allow more physicality? There were weeks of denials, first to Marc Stein at The Stein Line and then from the league office headlined by then-executive vice president Joe Dumars and senior vice president of referee development and training Monty McCutchen, discrediting the notion on The Lowe Post on ESPN that they secretly decided to let the players play more.
In April, the league changed its tune. After the board of governors meeting, commissioner Adam Silver announced at a news conference the league had made “a bit of an adjustment along the way” in how the game was being officiated in order to bring more balance to the game.
“We get feedback from our teams and we calibrate as we go in terms of how people view the game,” Silver said. “I think there was a sense earlier in the season that there was too much of an advantage for the offensive players.”
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Translation: The league pulled the strings to give certain advantages back to the defense. Which, by the way, I’m not arguing is a bad decision. The league kept it a secret and didn’t tell anyone outside of the referees. Not the teams. Not the media. And sportsbooks were, just as they are now, trying to list accurate over/unders without complete information.
This is important stuff. Relatedly, the NBA recently mandated teams to list accurate injury reports every 15 minutes, which was widely seen as a way to serve sportsbooks and help protect against inside information malfeasance in the wake of a bombshell gambling scandal.
Did the league office make another adjustment on the fly?
According to several head coaches and executives around the NBA, a league memo hasn’t been sent out to alert the stakeholders the game was being officiated any differently. But some team analytics groups have tried to make sense of the new officiating trends they were seeing and presented the data to front offices and coaching staffs, according to sources who spoke with Yahoo Sports. Many insiders have expressed skepticism that there is an explanation beyond an officiating alteration like the one seen in 2024.
So what’s changed exactly?
If players and head coaches want consistency, some areas of the game seem to be handled differently these days. But I should point out that one area that has been called consistently throughout the season is the foul rate on drives. Looking at the player-tracking data, 7.1% of drives have resulted in a foul in January, which was the same exact rate in December. That’s not it.
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Looking elsewhere, there are some clues as to why scoring has fallen lately. The biggest call that seems to be impacted is the three-shot foul, which in terms of referee power, may be the single-most influential call in the game. Anytime one whistle can give a team three points instead of zero is going to be scrutinized.
Turns out, the proportion of fouls that are called on 3-point shots has declined by 26% from October to January. Prolific three-shot foulers Jalen Brunson, Donovan Mitchell and Keyonte George had totaled 38 three-shot fouls entering January. Since the New Year? They’ve totaled one combined. Two other proprietors of the three-shot foul, Austin Reaves and Jerami Grant, simply haven’t played.
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Though the downturn in three-shot fouls may have led to some unhappy 3-point shooters, it has almost certainly improved the flow of the game. (There’s a reason why the G League goes with a one-shot free throw to earn 1, 2 or 3 points for the first 46 minutes of the game.)
In the aggregate, though the three-shot foul had been the more notable culprit to the early-season free throw parade, fouls on 2-point attempts have also dropped by about one per team per game in January. That might not seem like a lot, but even one less foul call means a lower likelihood of playing in the bonus, which helps to keep scoring totals in check.
It remains to be seen if the January drop will stick for the rest of the season. Teams, fans and sportsbooks would certainly like some normalcy. But a return to early-season free-throw levels can’t be ruled out. If you ask Jaylen Brown, maybe the only consistency is the inconsistency.
